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Shimizu Corporation Must Be Stopped!

Yeah, you read that right. And no, I don’t expect you to know who they are and why they Must Be Stopped, unless you keep abreast of the current high-tech news. In a nutshell, Japanese company Shimizu Corporation are the people that are trying to build this:

The first Death Star

And yes, you’re seeing that picture correctly as well. It is the most terrible weapon of mass destruction in the history of the future, capable of destroying whole planets (sorry Alderaan). Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t know that Shimizu Corporation is the construction arm of the new Galactic Empire; I can’t prove that its principal shareholders are Sith Lords and corrupt republicans bent on galactic domination. What I do know is this: they are attempting to turn our Moon (the only one we have!) into a satellite object very similar to the space station/weapon depicted above and encountered so many times in the Nerd’s Bible. Preposterous, you say! Unthinkable, you quip! Impossible, you opine! Sadly, my friends and digital companions, you are mistaken. Here is the proof. Go ahead and read that over, then read it again. Take a look at the graphics, paying special attention to the Master Plan, as it were. Now tell me that they aren’t trying to build the Death Star – in orbit around our own planet, no less! Go ahead, tell me… The silence is deafening.

Now, I understand the arguments you may (foolishly!) bring to the table. Statements such as, “They’re only going to use it to collect solar energy more efficiently!” or, “There aren’t any mentions of Stormtroopers in that article!” or perhaps (erroneously), “The company is Japanese. There aren’t any Asians in Star Wars!”

Lieutenant Telsij - need I say more?

I tell you right now, people, such thinking is willful ignorance, and the only thing it will get us will be the creepy laughter of an old, cloaked and hooded man with lightning in his fingers and terribly bad teeth. Here’s how it’s going to go down, in the eyes of Shimizu Corp.:

1. Deceive the world, under the guise of the (relatively) new Green movement, that this project is in the best interest of the world and all her beautiful, furry little creatures. Especially penguins – everyone loves penguins. Make it abundantly clear that this project will save the penguins by keeping their little igloos from melting. For all intents and purposes, consider this step already accomplished.

2. Bribe, coerce, shanghai, hornswaggle, and bedazzle all the most important world leaders (be they in government or big business, it matters not) into believing that: a) they will make lots of money by investing in this project, and b) the citizens/shareholders they represent will love them forever and foralways for saving the penguins. This step most likely has not been accomplished just yet, but with the help of the Jedi Mind Trick and a few trillion Yen, it can’t be far off.

3. Once funding has been secured, launch a lunar mission and proceed with the Master Plan, which will culminate in the construction of a multi-thousand mile long belt of photovoltaic panels, and a large laser/microwave array for “beaming” energy to the Earth. Obviously the most involved step in the process, it will nonetheless proceed very swiftly. Japan already has a highly sophisticated, semi-independent space agency in place capable of carrying out the job: JAXA. The organization is responsible for several of the most sophisticated, high-tech space excursions on record, including the WINDS high-speed satellite-based internet signal project, and the OICETS optical communication (aka laser!) mission. With all this laser-beaming and inter-orbital communication building, it’s easy to see they are already planning a network of world-dominating satellites to support their new Death Star – er, LUNA RING. And they have the technology and materiel ready to start the project today, if they wanted to.

4. Once construction is complete, it only remains to hold the world hostage with the threat of tens of thousands of terawatts of power in the form of a HUGE F&%#ING LASER at their fingertips, so to speak.

To put it in (somewhat) more tangible terms, the moon receives roughly 13,000 terawatts of solar energy from the sun on a continual basis. The average bolt of lightning peaks at around one terawatt, or one trillion watts = 16.66666666666666666666666666 (you get the idea) billion of your average incandescent light bulbs. So basically, we’re talking 13 thousand bolts of lightning worth of energy hitting the moon every second. Collecting even a fraction of that and concentrating it into a laser or microwave beam could yield devastating results as a weapon. Don’t think microwaves can be used as a weapon? Remember that really creepy, quiet kid in junior high? Remember his family’s chihuahua that suddenly stopped pissing on the neighbors’ yard the same day the family had a really big mess to clean up in their nice new GE appliance? At any rate, a concentrated beam of microwave energy can be just a dangerous as a laser beam.

Now, I’m not saying the planet can just be destroyed in a huge fiery explosion that looks something like this:

The physics for such an explosion just aren’t realistic. For one, because a planet isn’t exactly combustible the way a tennis ball full of gunpowder is, and for two, because the amount of energy to not only cause the planet to disintegrate into such small pieces, but to simultaneously give each of those pieces enough energy to, not just break the planet’s gravitational escape velocity, but to exceed it at such an explosive rate, is well beyond the capacities of such a laser (for a more detailed exploration of the physics of planet-destroying via Death Star, visit this link). However… 13,000 lightning bolts all striking the same place at once…that’s roughly 200 times the explosive force of the Little Boy that was detonated over Hiroshima. So we’re talking thousands of kilotons of TNT here… It’s a nice night for moonlit walk down the beach, isn’t it? OH GOD THE AIR ITSELF IS ON FIRE!!!!!!!!!!

Needless to say, this must be stopped at all costs. The fate of our planet is at stake. I think our good friend Carl said it best:

Unfortunately, the picture taken directly after this has been lost to time. However, I have it on good authority that he substituted the word “billboards” for the words “moon-based superlasers”. Trust me – the Force is strong with this one.